


So the Old Saying Goes (Time Heals All Wounds)

by Snabulous



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, Emotional Recovery, Forgiveness, Gen, Kravitz/Taako is very much in the background this fic is about Taako and Lucretia, M/M, Or lack therof, Post-Episode: e067-069 Story and Song Parts 1-3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 12:40:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18549952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snabulous/pseuds/Snabulous
Summary: Because if there’s one thing Taako knows about family, it’s that sometimes they do things that you cannot forgive.





	So the Old Saying Goes (Time Heals All Wounds)

Family is a sort of foreign territory for Taako.

For a long time, his one and only frame of reference of what “normal” looks like was that short period when he and Lup lived with their aunt. That was a good time for both of them, of course, but it was unstable. Didn’t have a great foundation, didn’t last very long. Like a sandcastle swept away by the ocean. And after that, it was just Lup and him, and he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that dynamic - two people relying on each other so totally, so co-dependently - wasn’t normal or even desirable in most circles. It was a relationship born out of necessity, but it was what they had, and Taako cherished it all through his young adulthood and up until…

Until. 

They didn’t need or want anyone else. Why would they when they had each other?

They kept this mindset, still, as they broke out of their plane on the Starblaster. There were more people to talk to consistently, sure, but they still didn’t desire an actual _bond_ with any of the others until much later.

Lup opened up first.

Taako remembers her breaking off to talk to Barry or Lucretia within the first couple of cycles. Nothing too extraordinary; she always was friendlier than him. But after the seventh cycle, Lup and Barry began spending more time together, with or without Taako, and when he was alone then, he felt almost isolated. It was tremendously scary at the time. He knew it was unwarranted, but it felt like a threat to his careful existence, comfortable and isolated as it was, that he and Lup had cultivated for decades.

But Lup knew - she always knew - and made sure to include him as much as possible. She somehow managed to coax him out of his shell, slowly introducing him to the idea of other relationships like a skittish cat to a giant, overly excited dog. And they were still each other’s number one, no matter what. She was sure to make that abundantly clear to him with every shared smirk and every playful arm around his shoulder.

Taako began to spend more time with the others, and he felt himself opening up to them, and it took for _ever_. He had to make an effort not to slam the door in everyone’s faces when they’d show genuine interest in him because no one had ever asked him about himself without ulterior motives. He had to constantly remind himself that people not knowing everything about him without him having to say, like Lup did, wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. 

But eventually, the seven of them were thick as thieves. Taako and Lup still spent most of their time together, but it wasn’t _just_ them anymore. At some point along the way, “my coworkers” turned into “my friends” and then into “my family.” He found himself surrounded with people he trusted more than the laws that governed the planar system itself.

Needless to say, one hundred years of this managed to tweak his brain a bit.

Lup is still number one. He’d take her over anyone and everyone because she is practically half of his heart and soul, but damn it. _Damn it_ , the others are nearly as important to him as his sister. 

Even Lucretia.

Even now.

Because if there’s one thing Taako knows about family, it’s that sometimes they do things that you cannot forgive.

Taako feels no obligation whatsoever to forgive Lucretia. The others were damn fast about it, but he just can’t. She took everything from him. His memories, his sister, all that fucking _growth_. Gone. Stolen. Not a single part of him wants to forgive that, so he won’t.

But he can move on.

It’s probably not healthy or whatever, but the alternative is letting Lucretia’s misguided choices break up Taako’s family, and that is unacceptable. Not after everything the seven of them have been through. Not after everything _he_ went through to let these people close to him. Letting Lucretia’s choices destroy it all would raze to the ground a century’s worth of dedication, and it would have all been for nothing. So, no _fucking_ thank you.

It took a while for him to remember that, though. For the first few months, he was prepped and ready to go on the whole never-speaking-to-Lucretia-again thing. He skipped out on stuff he knew she was going to be at because looking at her made him want to be sick because it hurt so badly still. For a while, he even avoided Magnus because she always seemed to be by his side. They were still so close, even after what she did.

Lup seemed intent on ignoring Taako’s antipathy for Lucretia, though, and constantly brought her around to the house they and their respective partners shared. When Kravitz was around, Taako would drag him upstairs to their room or curl sullenly into him on the couch, ignoring anything that wasn’t Kravitz until she was gone. Lup gave him side-eye about it, but she never said anything and kept bringing Lucretia around.

During one visit, the two women set up shop in the kitchen and just talked. It was casual, friendly. Signifying a closeness. A bond. One Taako was losing.

And then they started laughing.

Over what, he didn’t catch, but whatever it was sent them into a five-minute-long bout of hysterics that reverberated through the walls and into Taako and Kravitz’s room, clear as a bell. Their two laughs were indistinguishable from each other through the walls, and it hit Taako like a train through a greenhouse.

He scrambled out of bed, disentangling from Kravitz’s limbs and shaking him from the warm mid-afternoon daze he’d been in. Making hasty apologies, he threw on a shirt, no, not that one, that one clashes with these pants dammit, and hurtled into the hallway.

He managed to slow to a normal pace before he reached the kitchen, detangling some knots in his hair with his fingers to be at least a _little_ presentable.

“Hey,” he said, announcing to them his presence. (His first word to Lucretia in months was “ _hey_.”)

They both looked at him, residual grins still on their faces but Lucretia’s fading fast at the sight of him.

“So, I was thinking breakfast for dinner, just for the hell of it,” he continued, leaning on the doorframe. “I’ll have to go get some stuff, but I want pancakes like nobody’s business.”

Lup gave him two thumbs up. “Sounds good to me.”

Taako looked at Lucretia expectantly, and she smiled, the slowness of it betraying her caution.

“I don’t want to intrude on your dinner; I-”

“Don’t even worry about it,” he cut her off, waving his hand. “We always end up making enough for two extra people anyway.”

That dinner was the beginning of a return to the wonderfully normal. As time kept going, as time is wont to do, Taako found himself thinking less and less about what happened as it became less and less important to his daily life. These days, he only really thinks about it if someone mentions it, but luckily people rarely do. Sure, sometimes he wakes up in the early hours, crying and panicked, having dreamt that he forgot Lup again, but that’s only sometimes. It’s probably not totally fine, but it’s so much better than any alternative he can think of.

At Carey and Killian’s wedding, Taako and Lucretia danced together a few times.

That day, with its soft lights and music, every person he cared about within eyesight, the woman he thought he might never reconcile with here with her hand on his shoulder… It made his heart so full. He kept that to himself, but it was, irrefutably. And Lucretia, smiling and laughing with him, was also irrefutably an integral part of it.

So Taako didn’t have a lot to go off of when he decided it was probably okay to move on without necessarily forgiving. It was something he needed to do because he could understand her motivations, knew she did what she did because she saw pain in the people that she loved, and he knew what unbearable loss he would feel if even a single part of his family disconnected.

He spent too long without memory of them, and if anyone thinks he’s going to let a single one of them go, they’re just crazy.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! this is my first taz fic, so i hope i did alright :) feel free to message me on tumblr at snabulous and yell with me about taz or other podcasts!! <3


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